Lol @ a team of blondes making it this far + they're not even as strong as the BQ's

Love em!

They aren't even close to being as strong as Dustin & Kandice! I'm honestly not really sure how they are still in the Race.

On the last leg they seemed quite disoriented when presented with the necessity of leaving Bates & Anthony behind and racing on their own. Have they really spent the entire Race (up to this point) in the presence of at least one other team? (If so, then the producers need to create more opportunities for the teams to be alone while racing.)

It's almost as if Caroline & Jennifer went on the Race thinking that somehow they could just piggyback their way to the Finish Line on the coattails of another team (in this case, Bates & Anthony) without much real effort on their part. I'm not sure how well that will work for them in the remainder of this Race, but in The Amazing Race I'm used to watching, that is just not possiblealmost impossible.*

Anyway, that was just my impression of them from this last episode. I'll turn the "Rant Button" off now before I get going even more!

*Not quite impossible. See Season 10.

and yet they never arrived last

you know technically, 3 of the final 5 teams had all arrived last in a leg Maxie and Derbies Mom were saved by NELand Youtubes were saved by Alabama's penalty

Really, Carol&Jen and HockeyBrothers are the only team that hasn't arrived last so farthat's kind a the key to this race anyway "you always have to be ahead of at least one team", except for the final leg. and Carol&Jen has done that so far, regardless on their relationship and intention to keep HockeyBrothers. the blondes raced pretty good <3

for me personally, any teams that arrived last should just be eliminated.I don't know maybe that's kind a insane, though LOL

NELs rock. And Joey and Meghan did arrive last, but that doesn't mean they should have been eliminated on the spot because Chucknona didn't complete the leg correctly. So, there's three teams who didn't get saved by an NEL technically.

Logged

"The Amazing Race shows the best and worst out of you. But if only negative things are shown, then it's probably you. - Jobby"

As the 11th leg of The Amazing Race completed on Sunday evening, the remaining 4 teams had worked their way through Belfast, Northern Ireland, by locating a giant ring, swimming in a muddy bog, and serving up trays of food for diners on the dry dock where the Titanic was built. After all was said and done, the country singers, Caroline Cutbirth (@TXSweetCaroline) and Jennifer Kuhle (@jenwayne), were the last to the Pit Stop and missed out on the chance to race for the million dollar prize. The Yak sat down with the girls to discuss their favorite locations on the race, their upcoming songs, and the flirtatious moments with Anthony and Bates.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The Yak: Thanks for chatting with us today, ladies! How are you both doing?Caroline: Awesome!Jen: Good.

The Yak: It was a pleasure watching the two of you race, so it made it even more heartbreaking to see you get so close to the end, but miss it by just a short distance.Jen: I know, we were so close!

The Yak: You mentioned you’d be writing songs about your time on the race. When do you think we’ll be able to hear those songs?Jen: Caroline, why don’t you tell them your latest song?Caroline: We’re going to release a song called “Hockey Player Heartbreak”, and it’s about our romance with the hockey players and how heartbroken we are that we’re not together any more.The Yak: Sounds like a hit song to me.Jen: It’s going to be huge! Heard all around the world!

The Yak: The viewers were glad to see that you didn’t give up in the bog snorkel challenge. If you had been able to chose the other teammate to complete the Road Block, do you think you would have made it to the Final 3?Jen: We couldn’t switch because Caroline had already done 6 Road Blocks and I had done 5, so I had to do that Road Block. If Caroline had done it, we absolutely would have been in the Final 3. She loves getting down and dirty, and she’s a swimmer and I’m not, but you can’t really look back because we didn’t really have a choice.Caroline: And I think that’s the thing with the Amazing Race that’s so cool and frustrating: circumstances happen and there were certain Road Blocks that Jen would have been better at than me, but I was in them and you just have to roll with it. She did the best she could, and I think that’s why we had such a great experience. It killed me because I knew that I would have been fine, but that was Jen’s 3 worst things: being cold, claustrophobic, and swimming.The Yak: So, Jen, that’s why you were ready to get out of the suit so badly at the end of the task? It was your claustrophobia?Jen: Yeah, and I would have been fine if I had finished it the first time. Then I got out and jumped into the second bog, which was even worse cause it was 5 times more muddy. If I had just touched the end and gone back, I would have been fine. I had over a minute left when I was watching it. So, getting back in the second time was the killer because you’re frozen. It was so cold. My hands and feet were completely numb. I couldn’t feel them. When I got back in the second time, I started cramping from being cold, and then the worst part was I just couldn’t breath. I was claustrophobic, my wetsuit was choking me, and so I had to get out and change wetsuits. I literally changed wetsuits 6 times, and each one took a half-hour because your body is swollen. You should have seen Caroline and I trying to get me into the second wetsuit.

Caroline: It was a task all by itself!Jen: So that was the struggle. If I had made it the first time, it would have still been awful and horrible, but I wouldn’t have had to get back in. The getting back in was the tough part.The Yak: The important part was seeing that you didn’t give up.Jen: We had made a promise to each other that we’d never give up, and if I had been by myself, there would have been no way I would have gotten back in that water, but I promised Caroline, so I really did it for her. I knew we made a promise that we’d never give up, and she’s the only person in the world I would have gone back in there for.Caroline: I’m so proud of her because I knew how much Jen was struggling, and Jen’s not a quitter and not a complainer, so I knew she was really struggling. I’m so proud of her, and we just wanted to finish the race with our heads held high and know that we tried the best we could at everything. I think we did that.Jen: Caroline was so supportive. She was a great friend the whole time. While I was doing that, it must have been frustrating for her to watch, but she was nothing but supportive and just a great friend.Caroline: Well, you’re a great friend, too!

The Yak: Going back to the hockey players, Anthony and Bates: You seemed to get close during the race, and you touched on it a bit with the “Hockey Player Heartbreak” song, but have you kept in touch with them and with any of the other teams since the race ended?Jen: We keep in touch with the hockey players, of course. We went and saw Anthony play a game. We became really close with Max and Katie and Chuck and Wynona. I text Wynona all the time.Caroline: I know, me, too!Jen: I know everything about her! [Caroline and Jen laugh] So, we really came out of the race with some good friends.

The Yak: What was your favorite location on the race?Caroline: I love them all. It was so cool because you think, “When am I ever going to go to Africa?”, but it’s a place that Jen and I both wanted to go, so that was so cool to see. The same with Vietnam. It’s such a cool country, but I don’t know that I would have ever gone in my lifetime. Personally, I loved Scotland because I found my husband, Jim, there, and that was true love. [laughs]Jen: Switzerland took my breath away. It was so beautiful, and I’ve never seen anything like that in my life. Obviously, it’s so expensive to travel there, so we feel so fortunate that we got to do it.

The Yak: Would you ever consider doing The Amazing Race again or another reality type show in the future?Jen: Definitely, I’m waiting on All-Stars.Caroline: I’d love to do The Amazing Race again.Jen: We’re waiting for All-Stars to call us.Caroline: Yeah, hello?!?

The Yak: What was the toughest challenge that you faced, and was there anything you weren’t expecting before going into the race that surprised you?Jen: Everything surprised us. Every single challenge is so random and I don’t know how they even come up with this stuff.Caroline: I think we had a lot of challenging moments. Jen, of course, struggled with the bog and the sand castles during the first challenge. I struggled with the bagpipe. I mean, you try to prepare for the race, but I would have never practiced blowing a bagpipe. I think it’s all kind of surprising. You just have to get in there and go for it the best you can because it’s crazy!

The Yak: Speaking of trying to prepare, did you do anything special to get yourselves ready for the race once you found out you had been chosen?Jen: We obviously trained. We both tried to get in as best shape as we could. We went through a little camp at Caroline’s dad’s rance, and he taught us how to knot tie and balance and every kind of weird, random thing we thought might help for the race.Caroline: Yeah, we tried to get into physically good shape. I wasn’t really a great runner before Amazing Race, and now because of Amazing Race, I ended up running a half-marathon because I was running so much and I just pushed it that far. It definitely pushed us to get physically fit.Jen: Maybe I need to try out for the race again to get back into shape. [Caroline and Jen laugh]

The Yak: What’s next for the both of you?Jen: We’re just working on music and we’re still best friends, so you never know what might be next.Caroline: We’re just taking everything as it comes along.Jen: We definitely feel like we have something special together with music and we like working together, so we are open to opportunities and excited to see where the road will lead.

The Yak: Thanks for chatting with us, and we hope to see you back on our television screens soon!Caroline: Awe… Thank you!Jen: Thank you!

Read what Caroline and Jennifer said about their time in the Race, and if they still keep in touch with Bates and Anthony!

Cassidy B: Caroline and Jennifer: Did you work against the Alliance because you figured it was a good idea, or because you didn't want a target on your back, as well?Jennifer: We never even knew they had an alliance! Ours started jut because we were the outsiders! We got lucky we made it further!Caroline: Bates and Anthony and Max and Katie and us all agreed to U-turn Mona and Beth and Joey and Meghan to make sure we all were protected and because we were in our own Alliance.

Ryan D: To Caroline & Jen and Bates & Anthony... So did you guys ever go on a real date with each other after the race?Jennifer: Not yet, but you still never know!Caroline: We love our race boyfriends! I think we are the longest relationship either of them has ever had, haha, so yes, they better take us out to a nice steak dinner with their million dollars!

Cheryl K: YAY!! I am happy Bates and Anthony won!!! Why did Caroline and Jen have a tough time with the snorkeling part??Jennifer: It was so cold that my feet and hands were numb... You could start cramping in the water because you were frozen... And then I got claustrophobic and couldn't breathe... And when I did breathe, I was inhaling mud and bog!!! Hahaa. It was very difficult.Caroline: Jen hates being cold, is not a great swimmer and gets claustrophobic. So basically, this was the worst challenge ever for her lol.

Kate M: Will you go back and visit some of those places again?Jennifer: I hope so! I loved Switzerland and Africa!Caroline: We would LOVE to go back to all of the places we visited, I especially would love to return to Bora Bora on a romantic vacation.

Runjal P:Jennifer and Carolyn what was the toughest challenge?Jennifer: The bog challenge!!!!Caroline: I struggled with the bagpipes in Scotland because my mouth stopped working. Jen really had a hard time with the bog in Ireland.. All the challenges are super hard and really push you to your limits.

Mele G: If you could go back and tell your pre-amazing race self one thing what would it be?Jennifer: Always stop and ask for a map!! Trying to remember people telling directions is challenging when you're racing and in a hurry!Caroline: Find internet and print a map every time I’m looking for a location.

Yes, I wanted to discuss the challenges in Belfast that led to their elimination, specifically Jen's Bog Snorkeling struggles and the subsequent directional misadventures.

And yes, I wanted to talk about their close alliance with Hockey Brothers Bates & Anthony, who won this season's million dollar prize with frequent assists from the two country singers.

But no matter where the conversation with this season's fourth place finishers went, I made sure I was leaving enough time to ask about the very strange story that Jen recounted when the teams were in Bali.

"She kept her pet flying squirrel in her bra, and it died of loneliness," Jen said of Caroline.

Now, the truth about Joey the Flying Squirrel can finally be revealed.

Click through for Jen & Caroline's full exit interview. And stay tuned over the next three nights for the remainder of this season's "Race" interviews...

HitFix: For all the assistance you gave them along the way, how much of that million dollars you would say Bates and Anthony probably owe you?Caroline Cutbirth: [Laughing.] I think they owe us at least 10 grand each.

Jennifer Kuhle: You went way down, Caroline! This morning you said it was the whole million dollars.

Caroline: I know, but that's probably a little bit unreasonable, but 10 grand each is totally fair. We saved their hide so many times.

Jennifer: I would take 10 grand. when you talk to them, would you tell them that please?

HitFix: Unfortunately, I talked to them earlier. But I have to say that 10 grand sounds fairly reasonable.Caroline: Did they agree also that they need to give us some money?

HitFix: Unfortunately, I didn't phrase a question to them in exactly that way, but they definitely seemed appreciative for your assistance.Caroline: Awww. I'm gonna go beat 'em up.

HitFix: Did it strike you guys either during the Race or after that you maybe should have been trying to knock the professional athletes out of the Race rather than trying help them.Jennifer: You know what? To be honest, we never thought about that. We really enjoyed racing with them. They were good guys and it's tough out there, so to have friends that you feel like are really genuine friends is nice. And then when it started getting down to like five teams left, we were like, "Uh-oh. We'd better start thinking about ourselves and not giving away so many hints and everything." So we kinda had to strange our strategy.

Caroline: But that's just Jen and my personality. We really love people and we love friends and we're really open people in general, so it's very hard for us to withhold information, especially from people who we truly just love. So I don't think we would change anything. We had a great Race with them and our alliance paid off. They're a strong team, but they were looking out for us and so I don't think we'd do anything different.

HitFix: How would you say that the alliance benefited you both in the competition, but also just in the psychological way of having a friend along the way?Jennifer: I think it was more psychological for us, because even with the U-Turn situation, we still were so far ahead of the other teams that it wouldn't have mattered, because we all made the pact to save each other. But we were still there so early that it didn't matter. But I think just psychologically, just knowing that we had that and knowing that we had people that were gonna help us out along the way and vice versa, I think that is a good feeling when you're out there, because it's tough. You kinda feel like you're in the Hunger Games sometimes.

Caroline: You do!

Jennifer: So to have friends out there is really nice.

Caroline: We didn't go into the game saying, "We're gonna make alliances." It sorta just happened naturally, because we just really hit it off. Yeah, I think it was a good thing. Like Jen said, you feel safe.

HitFix: Were you aware throughout of all of the times they were following you guys and sticking with you when you knew the right ways to get places and whatnot?Jennifer: Oh yeah.

Caroline: Yeah, we were fine with it at the beginning and then, like we were saying earlier, when it started getting down to... Like I think it was in Berlin when we were racing for last place and the guys chose the same Detour as us and we were like, "Great." Like of course, we like doing stuff with them, but if it's down to Bates & Anthony or us, they're gonna win every single time. You know? Because it's a race to the finish line. So definitely, as teams were dwindling down, it got scarier.

HitFix: You guys had a pretty bumpy last Leg. When you think back on the Bog Snorkeling and then going to the wrong Thing with the Ring and then trying to get to the Detour, which of those missteps do you think played the biggest role in sending you home?Caroline: I think something that Jen and I, we knew this, but it's really hard to do this when you're in the middle of it all: Directions. We struggled with direction and we were in such a panic and we were struggling from the bog to make up time and we went into this little hole-in-the-wall, cute little hardware store and this guy was so confident that he knew what we were talking about that we just trusted him. If Jen and I every get invited back for All-Stars, which we really hope happens, we would always go to the Internet, always. Always go to the Internet and print out a map and look it up and just be 100 percent sure, because honestly you can't really take someone's word for it and we learned that the hard way.

HitFix: How long would you say that that misdirection took you out of your way?Jennifer: It probably took us out of the way by an hour or an hour-and-a-half and that meant the whole Race. We saw watching it back that Mona and Beth were really struggling on their Detour and we went through the graffiti so fast. If we hadn't gotten lost, we probably would have gotten third place, so that was a big mistake.

Caroline: It was a big mistake. That was hard to watch back, because you're just kicking yourself in the head going, "Shoot! We knew to get directions from the Internet," but you have to cut yourself some slack, because it is so hard out there and you're in such a panic and your mind's not totally true-on straight, so we were really proud of our Race. And, you know, that's just our Race overall. And that's the way the cookie crumbles, unfortunately.

Jennifer: Yeah. Know what? When you're doing the challenges, sometimes things happen. Like, for example, the bog. I did not want to get back in there. Physically, I thought there was no way I could do. And the thinking with Caroline and the bagpipes, she physically said, "I really can't do it." So when you're in both kinda situations and you power through it, we would never look back and say, "Shoot, that really screwed us up," because there's nothing you can do about that. That's just something you have to get through. But on the direction, the mistakes you make are what really kills you when you think back on it. You know? You don't think back going, "Oh shoot. I really screwed us up in the bog." I would never think that, but on the directions, I'd be like, "Shoot, now that was a mistake that... we could have gotten that one right."

HitFix: You mentioned that you both had those difficult Roadblocks, with Jen and the bog-snorkeling and Caroline and the bagpipes. In the moment, I assume those things drive you nuts and you're freaking out about them long after. You've had a couple months to get past them. Were you able to watch those episodes will a cool head?Jennifer: Watching it for me, I had anxiety all over again last night. I was dreaming about the Race again. I don't ever want to think about that bog ever again for the rest of my life. So no. It doesn't matter how many months later, I still hate it.

Caroline: The bog and the bagpipes are similar in this scenario. If we both would have achieved the goal the first time, we could have been fine. It would have been fine. The problem with the bagpipes was that my mouth started going out and it only happened after I'd been blowing the bagpipe for a while. If I would have just gotten it the first time, I wouldn't have had that problem with my mouth. And the same with Jen. If she would have just not jumped over that little extra wedge and gotten through the bog the first time, it would have been fine, but doing those kinda challenges for a second and third and fourth and, for me like a thousand times with the bagpipes, that's when you start to lose it, because your body starts shutting down. And once your body starts shutting down, it's like, "Oh my gosh. We're screwed." It's hard. You don't know what to do, because it's like you're at a total disability at that point.

HitFix: How hard is it to be the other person at a Roadblock like that, where your partner and friend is struggling and there's nothing at all you can do?Jennifer: Gosh, Caroline was just the best friend that anyone could ever ask for. She was walking all along the bog, supporting me and saying I could do it. Honestly, if it was just me and I was competing for myself, I don't think I would have gotten back in and finished it. I did not care. The only reason I finished it was for Caroline and just, you know, our friendship. We promised each other we would never give up and we didn't. We pulled through together.

Caroline: I think that's so true. Jen was the same for me when I was struggling with the surfboards in Bali and the bagpipes in Scotland, she was so support. That's the beauty of our friendship. We've been in a band for seven years. We've worked together in such hard, hard situations and we totally trust each other that in any situation we're going to get in, we know that we're gonna do the best we can. I trust that Jen was doing the best she could do in the bog situation. Although, I mean, she was having a full-blown meltdown and it was because it was so hard for her in that situation. We never mad at each other or tear each other down, because we truly believe that each other was doing the best they can and I think that's why we had such a good time on the Race.

HitFix: How close did either one of you come to getting mad or impatient?Jennifer: We never actually got close at all. If anything, when one of us was struggling, we felt so bad for the other other. We weren't close. The only only times we got frustrated with each other were driving.

Caroline: And I will say that I was scared for a second with Jen, because I've never heard Jen say she's gonna quit something and that actually just made me feel worried and I was like, "Oh no. This is really bad if she's saying she's gonna quit this." So I think that the only fear I had was at that point. But then she pulled through.

HitFix: Now, I have to get to an important question. Caroline, did you actually have a flying squirrel as a pet?Caroline: Yes! I love rodents! I had rats growing up my whole life. I had like six different pet rats. I had pet mice. I always wanted a ferret and a hedgehog. And then when I was in college, I went to the fair and I'm kinda an impulsive pet-buyer anyway -- which I've grown out of in my older years -- and there's a flying squirrel there and I just had to have it, so I bought it and I would take it to all my co-writers with me and take it to school and it'd pop its little head out, because it'd be sleeping between my boobs.

Jennifer: The funniest thing is Caroline, we'd be writing with people and it would literally be in-between her boobs, so when it would pop out, people were staring at her and they were like, "What in the world?" And they were so embarrassed, because they didn't want to be staring at her boobs, but how could you not when there's a squirrel inside of them.

Caroline: It was pretty funny.

HitFix: And what actually happened to it? It couldn't really have died of loneliness, right? I need to know the truth here!Caroline: No, it did. It died of loneliness.

Jennifer: Her boobs were not enough.

Caroline: My boobs were not enough friends for Joey and he died. He had a little sock that he slept in in his little house and then one day he was just dead in the sock. It was really sad. Really, ready sad. Thank you for bringing these really sad memories.

HitFix: Oh no! OK. We can't end the interview on this. Quickly, give me a favorite moment from the Race that maybe we didn't get to see on TV.Caroline: One of the really great moments we had was a guy gave us $200 on the airplane on the way to Botswana and I couldn't believe that this guy gave us money. We were like, "Oh my gosh, we're gonna be rich! We're gonna buy a bottle of water in every airport and we're gonna buy meals!" And then our ticket the next day was $180 dollars. So in that sense, you didn't see that on the show.

HitFix: Now, I have to get to an important question. Caroline, did you actually have a flying squirrel as a pet?Caroline: Yes! I love rodents! I had rats growing up my whole life. I had like six different pet rats. I had pet mice. I always wanted a ferret and a hedgehog. And then when I was in college, I went to the fair and I'm kinda an impulsive pet-buyer anyway -- which I've grown out of in my older years -- and there's a flying squirrel there and I just had to have it, so I bought it and I would take it to all my co-writers with me and take it to school and it'd pop its little head out, because it'd be sleeping between my boobs.

Jennifer: The funniest thing is Caroline, we'd be writing with people and it would literally be in-between her boobs, so when it would pop out, people were staring at her and they were like, "What in the world?" And they were so embarrassed, because they didn't want to be staring at her boobs, but how could you not when there's a squirrel inside of them.

Caroline: It was pretty funny.

HitFix: And what actually happened to it? It couldn't really have died of loneliness, right? I need to know the truth here!Caroline: No, it did. It died of loneliness.

Jennifer: Her boobs were not enough.

Caroline: My boobs were not enough friends for Joey and he died. He had a little sock that he slept in in his little house and then one day he was just dead in the sock. It was really sad. Really, ready sad. Thank you for bringing these really sad memories.

Whoever said this seasons' cast is not colourful.. I don't know which season they have been watching. The country singers are my favourite team this season. <3

Logged

"The Amazing Race shows the best and worst out of you. But if only negative things are shown, then it's probably you. - Jobby"

I don't remember seeing much of Caroline and Jennifer's role in guiding the transportation for Bates and Anthony, but it reminds me of Tara doing the same for Chris/Alex. In both AR22 and AR2, this allowed an athletic male/male team to win in place of what might have been the helping team. I happen to see that as self-limiting (there are some other less kind words for it).

I'm pretty sure Caroline and Jennifer benefited more from Bates and Anthony in the alliance.. or it's a mutually helping one another. The only self-limiting factor would be the teams not working together to get the Hockey brothers out. But considering both accounts where there were the Double U-TURNs, Dave and Connor quit the leg and for the second one, the moms and Youtubers were so far behind, it doesn't matter whether the Hockey brothers were U-TURNed or not. I think it's Bates and Anthony race to lose this season and they didn't.

Logged

"The Amazing Race shows the best and worst out of you. But if only negative things are shown, then it's probably you. - Jobby"